Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Eddie Jovo is not playing very coy about his preferences as free agency nears. While he waits in Florida where he spends all of his offseasons with his wife, who is from Florida, he talks about what good buddies he is with new Panther Todd Bertuzzi.

I think we can cross the Panthers off the list.

Apparently Blake will resign with the Avs while it would be a reasonable bet that either Chara or Redden will resign with the Sens. One would think that Nik Lidstrom would resign with the Wings but unless he takes a little bit of a hometown discount it may not happen.

In all of the Pronger talk the Wings have been ignored. If Lidstrom takes a powder, would they be a possible destination?

Anyhow, once the dust clears it is possible that there will be only one or two big Dmen out here to sign. Once they are gone then I think the calls to Lowe come in.

With the salary floor rising to 28M don't be surprised to see a team like Philly find a team that needs to add salary and thus take a contract from them. If so, Philly will be in play for Pronger.

Some mention Buffalo. Can't see it - not with the success they had with the D by committee.

Who else? Chicago. Nashville. St. Louis. Columbus. Atlanta. The Islanders. The Rangers. The Penguins.

Pretty well nearly anyone south of the 49th as well as T.O., I'd guess. There are exceptions, of course. But if a GM or owner looks at this and sees two, three or four playoff rounds worth of revenue as well as a possible Cup in this guy then they will make Lowe an offer he can't refuse.

Detroit has been overlooked, haven't they... if Lidstrom takes a powder (or wants a max. deal, which I don't think the Wings can afford), then they become the clear front-runner, I'd say.

(You take the $$ diff. between Pronger and Lidstrom ($1M-$1.5M?), plus the salary they'd send to EDM in the trade, and suddenly DET has flexibility to get shit done that they really don't have right now.)

Are the pictures of your kid (I'm presuming) meant to deceive us into not noticing that this is a Pronger post, or merely to cushion the blow? Because kids, like kittens, are cute. They can't play 30 minutes a night on the Oilers' blue line, but, well, it's a start.